University of Virginia Library

Agricultural Department.

Professors MALLET and BŒCK.

The late Samuel Miller, of Lynchburg, having by deed given in
trust one hundred thousand dollars for the establishment of a Department
of Scientific and Practical Agriculture at the University of
Virginia, the Trustees met the Rector and Visitors of the University
on the 17th of September, 1869, and arrangements were made for
putting the said department in operation.

The Trustees nominated, and the Visitors elected, J. W. Mallet,
Ph. D., M. D., Professor of Analytical and Agricultural Chemistry,
and L. J. Bœck, Ph. D., Professor of Mechanics and Engineering as
applied to Agriculture.

The organization and entire control of the Agricultural Department
belonging to the Board of Visitors, with the exception of the
right and duty of the Trustees to nominate the Professors to be
employed in the same, the said Board has proceeded to set apart
certain lands belonging to the University as an Experimental Farm,
to be conducted in conformity with the directions of the Professors
of Agriculture. On these grounds experiments are now in progress.

The foundation of two scholarships in connection with the Agricultural
Department has also been authorised, with the view of
securing the more thorough training of students, of aptitude and
zeal for experimental investigations in those branches of knowledge
and inquiry upon which the progress of scientific agriculture in this
State must chiefly depend. Selections for these scholarships will be
made from graduates in the studies of the Department upon competitive
examination — one to be appointed at the close of each session
for the term of two years next succeeding.

An additional professorship in the University has been created to
provide instruction in Scientific and Practical Agriculture and the
branches of Natural History relating to Agriculture, and this Chair
will be filled at the annual meeting of the Board of Visitors in July
of the present year.

Students in the Agricultural Department may of course avail
themselves of the benefits of instruction in any of the schools of the
University on the same terms as other students.